Growing up morally: An experiential classroom unit on moral development

Author:

Gosenpud, Jerry J.; Werner, Jon M.

Abstract:

One reason why many of today’s
business leaders are frequently
viewed as unethical, corrupt, and
corruptible is that values transmitted
(implicitly) by university business
education courses influence students
to ignore ethics. This paper argues
that to help future business leaders
become more ethical, business
school implicit values should reflect
a more ethical direction. The present
paper describes an experiential
pedagogy designed to help students
develop morally. It does so by
asking students to: 1) participate
in exercises sensitizing them to
ethical issues, 2) reflect on their
own ethical values and decisions
they’ve made in the past that either
mirror or contradict those values,
3) read about and understand
moral development models, and
4) self-assess in terms of stages
of their own moral development,
as portrayed in the models.
Qualitative and quantitative results
are summarized for five separate
uses of the complete pedagogy in
undergraduate Social Responsibility
courses at a large Midwestern
university in the United States, as
well as for portions of the pedagogy
used in nine other classes over a 14-
year period.
...

Publisher:

Jyväskylän yliopisto, Business and Organization Ethics Network (BON)

Date:

2015

Belongs to series:

EJBO : Electronic Journal of Business Ethics and Organizational Studies